The disclosed embodiments of the present invention relate to achieving high-resolution control by using a low-resolution input, and more particularly, to a method for converting a control input of an input domain (e.g., an image-based object tracking domain) into a control output of a control domain using a variable control resolution technique and related control apparatus thereof.
Remote controls have been conventionally used to control electronic devices such as televisions. Remote controls facilitate control of the electronic devices. However, as electronic devices have become more complicated than before, the number of buttons of the remote controls has consequently increased in order to properly control the electronic devices. Thus, it is not easy to remember all the functions assigned to the respective buttons.
In order to solve this problem, several methods have been proposed to control an electronic device in an easy and convenient manner. For example, an image capturing apparatus may be attached to a display device (e.g., a television) for capturing a scene having the user included therein and accordingly generating a captured image for further processing. Next, the position of user's hand is detected by analyzing the captured image using an appropriate image processing algorithm. After the hand position is successfully identified, the position of a cursor shown on a display screen of the display device is controlled according to the detected hand position.
In general, the resolution of the captured image (e.g., 640×480 or 320×240) is lower than the resolution of the display screen (e.g., 1920×1080). Hence, pixel-level precision mapping between the high-resolution display screen and the low-resolution captured image is not possible physically. One conventional design linearly maps the hand position to the cursor position. However, the control resolution is low due to large resolution discrepancy between the captured image and the display screen. For example, a slight movement of user's hand would make the cursor have a large displacement on the display screen. Hence, it is not easy for the user to have fine control over movement of the cursor.